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Should sports players be banned for using recreational drugs?

I see Matt Stevens named on Lions squad. He was selected in 2005, but his career hit the buffers when he got a 2 year ban for cocaine use. Some credit must be due for making it back to that level again.

I can fully understand the need for a ban on performance enhancing drugs. But using drugs like cocaine in a recreational setting, should it really merit a penalty like a 2 year ban? Yes, it's a crime, but if he had been drinking and driving it would be nothing like that.

Is there a need to ban players for recreational drug use? Is it possible to separate recreational from performance enhancing? Is it all about being on message and is it just a piece of PR nonsense?

Well, if he is going to take nose candy, he would hardly have a moral objection to any other stimulant! Fair play to rugger chaps. If he'd been soccer player, he'd just have had to put a few quid into the poor box, and maybe miss the next game.

A cigarette can enhance performance in the short term, as it increases heart rate. Alcohol can also improve performance, particularly in sports like darts and snooker where it can calm a player. Using either in a recreational setting would not result in a ban.

A cigarette can enhance performance in the short term, as it increases heart rate. Alcohol can also improve performance, particularly in sports like darts and snooker where it can calm a player. Using either in a recreational setting would not result in a ban.

Nah, they should just segregate sports into competitions between those that aren't on drugs and those who are. It'd make the Olympics more interesting anyway, you'd be awarding the Gold medal to the guy who came in 5th, because the ones ahead of him would have collapsed of heart failure or grown an extra head.

'I am not gay, although I wish I were, just to piss off homophobes.' - Kurt Cobain

Cocaine, aka "Peruvian Marching Powder" is a performance enhancing drug that aids endurance and acts as a painkiller - it'd be very handy to use it during fitness training

cYp

It may help with the fitness training element but I would say a coked up sportsperson would be playing erratically to say the least. of little use in a team game or one that requires the player to pace themselves imo. performance would not be enhanced if that was so.
not to mention the sh1te that would be spouting out of said players gob. probably encourage some robust tackling i reckon (from his own team even). he may not feel the pain at the time but that could be a bad thing too - playing with damage will incur more serious damage

it also turns the blood to slush that can cause a heart attack or if there is a weak blood vessel a brain haemorrhage. not very enhancing to performance.but then again some 'athletes' seem be willing to shorten their lives just to win stuff.

on the OP I do think there should be a distinction between drugs taken to enhance performance and recreational ones.

Cocaine, aka "Peruvian Marching Powder" is a performance enhancing drug that aids endurance and acts as a painkiller - it'd be very handy to use it during fitness training

cYp

If you snorted coke and then went running at pace on a threadmill you would stand good chance of a heart attack! It has even happened to people who have drunk several cans of energy drinks before games.